Prayers for March, 2006

The North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church now offers free download of monthly as well as 31-day prayer calendars.

Read the March "Prayers of Hope" Calendar (PDF)

Drive-In Religion

Time Magazine has an interesting photo essay online -- "At the Drive-In Church", where you don't even have to get out of your car. I'm wonder how much spirituality is present in such situations.

Civil Rights movement example for Muslims?

The U.S. Civil Rights movement can be an excellent example for Muslims of how peaceful protest and actions can accomplish positive change. Listen to the NPR story, interviewing an Imam of a large mosque in northern Virginia.

Teens show risky online behavior

Chat, blog, group, and forum web sites attract teens, hungering for contact. Unfortunately, some of that contact is evil disguised. And in seconds an evil person can discover a lot of personal data about them -- if they have filled out a lot of information in their profile, for example. Such areas can be a criminal's dream. Worse, some teens don't seem to think through the consequences of online flirting (or worse) with strangers.

An attorney and child advocate runs WiredSafety.org, which tries to arm parents with information.

Read the full USA Today article »

Temple upkeep

We are supposed to treat our bodies like a temple, but we rarely do. Stress can greatly affect physical health. So learn to de-stress with these "Top Five Changes for a Low-Stress Lifestyle".

To learn more about cleaning up the temple, check out a page about "Stewardship of Health".

Feed Reader reviews

You don't really have to come to this web page to read the latest posts. All you have to do is set up to receive the "feed" from this page.

OK, OK, so now you're starting to get glassy-eyed and wondering about "feed". Well, a "feed" is the information about a posting here -- the title, date/time, and text of the post. You can access those via a "Feed Reader". Most are free.

Once you "subscribe" to a feed, your NewsReader automatically checks for new posts when you open it. Of course, you can still just check back here now and then.

cnet has reviews of several feed readers. An executive summary... if you use Internet Explorer, it looks like Pluck is a good one to try. [ Download Pluck ]

If you'd like to read blog feeds via a separate web page that collects "feeds" from different blogs for you, try the Google Reader or NewsGator.

If you are a FireFox user, you can "drag" a web address for a blog to your bookmark bar and it adds an orange "feed" icon. Clicking on that icon lets you see all current posts for that blog. Internet Explorer 7 is reported to also add this feature.

Top 50 U.S. Christians

"The Church Report's" annual Top 50 most influential Christians in the U.S. for 2005 is available online. Over 150,000 nominations were received from readers of The Church Report plus online submissions.

Alphabet zoo

Want a cute way to go over the alphabet with kids? How about the Alphabet Zoo? This Flash presentation uses alphabet letters to form an animal, this then gallops or scuttles away. Animal sounds accompany the presentation.

You can get the latest version of the Flash Player at Adobe (Adobe bought Macromedia).

Population growth over time

NOVA, at the PBS web site, has an interactive graph of human population over time. check it out. Consider the implications.

Ask yourself how Christians should approach the population topic. Is there any social action that Christians could or should be taking?

Pollute less - improve gas mileage

The Federal Trade Commission site has a page devoted to helping you get better gas mileage. Better mileage means less cost for you plus less pollution of God's earth. We don't "own" it, you know -- we're supposed to be taking care of it till Jesus returns.

Good, Better, Best -- How to Improve Gas Mileage

Gospel music builds 40-year friendship

National Public Radio reports that "Record producer Joel Dorn and photographer Lee Friedlander grew up listening to gospel and blues. " ... "Now they've put out a compilation of their favorite gospel songs from the 1950s and 1960s."

Listen to the story

Top Religious Trends of 2005

George Barna (The Barna Group) sets forth what he sees as the top religious trends of 2005, base on his prior interviews and surveys during the year. He says many (most) churches are not paying attention to the needs of spiritual seekers. He concludes that there are significant changes ahead and implies that mainstream churches must adapt or face serious decline.

Read Barna's article »

Darwin was right - again!

[Christian Science Monitor] Two separate research studies clear up some questions about Darwin's Theory of Evolution -- one of the best-supported theories around.

Read the article »

Polticians' messages lost sight of people

[NCC USA] National Council of Churches Secretary General Rev. Dr. Bob Edgar says that the President's State of the Union address as well as the Democratic party's response both fell short of the needs of average Americans and the marginalized in our society.

Read the NCC article »

How evolution really works

[Live Science] "... last week a [Catholic] Cardinal told the faithful to pay attention to scientific reason or risk returning to fundamentalism. ... The story of the origin of whales is one of evolution's most fascinating tales and one of the best examples scientists have of natural selection."

More »

Saudi women blogging along

Men and women exchanging ideas via an online blog (web journal) is against traditional Saudi custom. Yet, its starting to happen.

Read the article »

Saint and sinner cell phones

You have to see it to believe it. Cute yet weird. They really sell these things.

More »